Senior profile: Volunteering keeps retiree active

Editor’s note: The following is one in a series profiling local senior citizens each week.

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Born in Puerto Rico back in 1943, Jose J. Rodriguez, 73, has called New Mexico his home since 1966 when he moved to Clovis for the first time. But before Rodriguez came to the Land of Enchantment, he traveled to California back in 1951 to live with his three brothers and father.

Staff photo: Matthew Asher

Jose J. Rodriguez shows the food he’s cooked in preparation for Thursday’s Thanksgiving meal at La Casa Senior Center. The large pot he’s pointing to is turkey stock which he said he’ll be using for gravy, cornbread and to put in the mashed potatoes.

“My dad had lived in California for a few years before he sent for us,” Rodriguez said. “I remember every time one plane landed, the stewardesses had to walk us to another airplane and show us our seats. I forget how many planes, at least three or four. One plane felt like we were in a hurricane because that plane had a hard time staying in the air. I’ll never forget that.”

Rodriguez first moved to Selma, California, where he lived for seven years before moving to Bakersfield.

“I quit school when I moved to Bakersfield and then I quickly moved to San Francisco. I worked at the airport there driving a catering truck,” he said.

Rodriguez was in charge of transporting the airplane meals from the truck into the airplane where it would be loaded up.

“We’d raise the truck up and would exchange equipment,” he said. “We’d give them the new meals and take the old ones. I worked there about eight years. We worked for Delta, West Coast, Quanta’s Airlines.”

After his eight years in San Francisco, Rodriguez moved to Clovis, partially because of some miscommunication.

“There was a lady I knew had family in Clovis. Her uncles had some land. They wrote me a letter saying they would give me the land. I got there, and he had already sold the land,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez spent the next several decades working for farmers driving tractors, as well as working for meal distribution centers and the old peanut factory. It was here that Rodriguez met his wife, Donna McMurray. Rodriguez admits he forgets how many years they were married but the couple had three children: Joey, Felicia and LaShawn.

Although Rodriguez has been retired more than a decade, he still has plenty of activities to keep himself active. Nearly every day he’s at La Casa Senior Center helping out in the kitchen. Thursday’s Thanksgiving lunch the seniors enjoyed was primarily cooked by Rodriguez in a solo act.

“It keeps me busy, and it keeps me going,” he said. “I can’t sit still. A person that sits down, your muscles get tired. I do all this to stay active. I’ll also walk by Industrial Park a few times for exercise. I also have five acres that I’ve divided to my family, but I walk around there as well.”

Alice Montoya, a worker at La Casa Senior Center, said she loves all of her interactions with Jose.

“He’s always here,” Montoya said. “He came in at 6:30 this morning. Boiling turkeys, making cornbread for our Thanksgiving meal. Yesterday, he made pork chops. He calls bingo and loteria if I’m not here. He’s one of my main helps. If I need him for anything, he’ll do it.”

With his active lifestyle, Rodriguez plans on helping out at the senior center for many years to come.